Scholarship Endowment Fund

Pictured: Students at STSA Poanta School

“In 1960, the year after we arrived in exile in India in April 1959, we were able to speedily set up our first school in Mussoorie. Considerable effort was made to set up schools to give opportunities for modern education to the Tibetans in exile. In particular, in the early 1960s, many initiatives were taken to give more importance to setting up schools than monasteries in the Tibetan community in exile. The main reason why we especially devoted more attention to setting up schools was because it was extremely obvious that one cause of the miserable situation in which the Tibetan race found itself in was attributable to our major failure of being up to the standard in the field of modern knowledge. This resulted in our inability to set out strategies as a people at par with the rest of the world; it exposed us as too backward to be able to meet the challenges of modern times. It was in view of this that we considered setting up schools to be more important than building religious centres”.

~ His Holiness the XIVth Dalai Lama

Scholarship Endowment Fund

Every year there are about 600 Tibetan high school graduates seeking financial assistance in the form of scholarship from the Department of Education (DoE), Central Tibetan Administration. The DoE is only able to support less than half of those applicants, due to lack of adequate financial resources. On several occasions the DoE has to turn down applications of some of the most promising students with excellent academic achievements and results. It is indeed very unfortunate that due to sheer lack of funds, students have to compromise their dreams of higher education. To cope with the situation, the selection criteria are strictly based on academic merits and usually those who are academically weak are encouraged to pursue vocational courses, whereas students with strong academic achievements are supported with scholarships to pursue higher education and professional courses. There are a number of applicants who wish to continue on to Master’s degrees and Doctoral courses. The DoE encourages such applicants in an effort to nurture more scholars with specialized professions as envisioned by His Holiness.

Although school education India is basically provided for free under the norms of the government of India, most of the Tibetan families in India face difficulties when it comes to sending their children to college. It is only after completing their post-secondary education that most students need financial aid and this is where the gridlock is formed in their academic pursuits. Since this problem is ever growing with the increasing rate of student’s demand to pursue higher education, the Department of Education has designed this proposal call, “Scholarship Endowment Fund” to facilitate Tibetan children to continue their education in colleges.

The DoE proposes that each Tibetan Association/individual/group to make onetime contribution of US$10,000/ or any donation to form this specific amount. It is purported that the annual interest accrued from this specific amount will comfortably support annual scholarship of a student. Thus each $10,000 raised will generate enough funds continuously to support one student every year.

It is therefore through this “Scholarship Endowment Fund”, DoE strives to support financial need of those most in need and excellent students in a systematic manner. The DoE sends its requisition to the Tibetan communities/individuals/groups in the west to be its primary partners and stakeholders. We have been relying on foreign aid for last many decades and we are extremely grateful for all those generous foreign friends to lend us their helping hands when we most needed them. We will forever remain indebted to them. There are many who continue to support us in our children’s education and there is no better way to give back to the world than to invest in the future seeds of humanity. We will continue to be in the receiving end from those kind benefactors until our social-political situation changes. However, with the growing numbers of our own people in the west with many still struggling hard to support themselves and their families back in India/Nepal/Bhutan, we request them to make any nominal contribution that they can, for it is often said in Tibetan, “collection of droplets make an ocean”.

The DoE is most happy to recognize these contributions and will create fellowship in the name of respective Tibetan Association/Individual/Group if the funding is made in a lump sum. The donors may also keep in direct contact with the supported students under the project.

DoE scholarship committee under the supervision of Education Kalon will select the students based on individual’s academic performance as well as family financial background.

The scholarship desk of the DoE will maintain close contact with its students and scholarship funds will be released on installment basis. However to have their fund released, students need to submit their college admission form to the DoE to prove their admission into colleges. Further, the scholarship holder must secure minimum of 50% in their annual examination along with 75% attendance to continue the scholarship in following year. In order to respect the accountability & transparency of the program, the DoE will monitor activities of individual students and will submit certified periodical and report with financial statement to the donors if and whenever requested.

Donors from US may send in their support in the form of checks/money orders in favor of Tibetan Community Development Fund Inc, with memo listed as “SEF”